


The Pretender

by willowoak_walker



Category: Girl Genius (Webcomic)
Genre: Gen, Gil is musing, Mentioned Agatha/Tarvek, ambiguous future, the next threat is our family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-04
Updated: 2017-12-04
Packaged: 2019-02-10 09:33:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12909177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/willowoak_walker/pseuds/willowoak_walker





	The Pretender

    Gil had a good view from the airship, but a raised hand had the Wulfenbach troops holding their fire. The Knights of Jove held theirs, as well.  
    A wide space cleared around the two Storm Kings. There was a moment of stillness as they judged each other.  


    Two different sculptors, given instructions to create a modern Storm King, might have made them. Tweedle was Andronicus over again, armored, sworded, riding a horse that shone with its impossible whiteness. The sculptor had lifted half his equipment from traditional representations and spent the rest of their energy on the sideburns. They hadn’t even remembered the hammer.  


    Tarvek’s creator had some actual awareness of current events in Europa, and had given Tarvek a couple of wasp-eaters and an airman’s uniform. Hardly what he’d have wanted to be wearing, but he looked damn good in it. He leant on his stolen spear and swiped the blood across his face with the back of one hand.  


    Martellus wasn’t bloodstained. Was untouched by the battle.  


    Tarvek, afoot, had to look up to Martellus. The spear he leaned on would give him the reach, but he’d lose it if he got it stuck in the horse. The Storm Kings held their poses, the armies their breathes.  


    This moment was doubtless going to be memorialized by hundreds of artists, _The Pretender_ , or some such thing.  


    If Tarvek won.  


    If Tweedle won he would be a smoking hole and the Knights of Jove would go with him. The whole business would fall back into the background noise of rebellions, and Agatha’s children would be born red-headed and fatherless.  


    Tarvek had damn well better win.  


    Even Gil couldn’t have said who moved first when the fight began.


End file.
